-- The Riddle of Imperfection --

John Herlihy

We live in a world of imperfection,

All the while seeking a kind of perfection.

Solving the riddle a matter of happenstance,

As we live in a world of relative chance.

We may wonder why imperfection exists.

Why this state of flawed diamond persists,

Living with imperfection raises a mystery

Wherever we look, permanence we see.

Perfection found as diamonds in the rough.

Unblemished pearls speak of the right stuff,

Yet, here we are, full of self-doubt and pity.

How to overcome the limits of our history?

As imperfect beings, we can come to know,

All the good and bad in the tapestry we sew.

Comforted by the promise of future certainty,

Poverty of spirit can find richness in mystery.

The emptiness we experience in loneliness,

Informs the fulness that we find in solitude.

We can fall into the well of dissatisfaction,

To be uplifted on a wave brimming with joy.

We at times feel odd moments of perfection,

A taste of the infinite without any rejection.

In the presence of a mountain, we feel its soul,

Swim in the moving river, it envelopes us whole.

The world disappears into the moment of bliss,

Cleansing us of all the things we may ever miss.

The profound ecstasy summoned in sexual climax,

Infinite light finds its way thru the body’s cracks.

We look around to see imperfection everywhere,

To find a momentary perfection in the lover’s stare.

There in dusty light, in the movement of a shadow,

Premonition that waves to us as poppies in a meadow.

Perfection lies as a goal we will never on earth attain,

True perfection found only where imperfections reign.

The riddle of imperfection solved when nothing to prove,

When life’s puzzle completed, no single piece be removed.

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Copyright © John Herlihy

Thursday 1 October 2020